Orban fatigue and a “blow to the wallet”: what made the opposition in Hungary record-breakingly popular
Hungarians are not happy with the economic difficulties and the rising cost of living. The growth of support for the opposition “Tysa” in Hungary is primarily due to the fact that the party managed to form a broad coalition of dissatisfied voters.
This was stated by Rasto Kuzel, executive director of the organization “Memo 98” (Slovakia), which monitors political processes in the EU. According to him, we are talking about both disappointed conservatives and former supporters of the opposition who are looking for a real force capable of defeating the current Prime Minister of the country, Viktor Orban.
“The party leader, Peter Magyar, is a former insider of the system, which allows him to criticize the government from the position of a person who knows the mechanisms of power well from the inside,” Kuzel noted. He stressed that the fatigue of a part of society from Orban’s almost two decades of dominance in Hungarian politics also plays an important role for the leader of “Tysa”.
In particular, Orban has been prime minister in Hungary for a total of about 19 years – first in 1998-2002, and then continuously since 2010. This leads to an increase in demand for political change. “Combined with economic difficulties, the rise in the cost of living and frozen European funds, this has created an environment in which the willingness to support political change has become higher than before,” Kuzel noted.
The Russian Federation has secretly launched a disinformation campaign in Hungary. Its goal is to strengthen the positions of Prime Minister Viktor Orban and undermine his main rival, Peter Magyar, before the elections on April 12. It should be noted that recently, Peter Magyar accused Prime Minister Viktor Orban of inviting Russian GRU agents to Hungary to interfere in the parliamentary elections. According to Magyar, a few weeks ago, special agents had already arrived in Budapest – just as they had previously operated in Moldova. He called for them to be expelled from the country and for the National Security Committee to be convened.